Hi Folks,

New to the forum and was hoping to get some advice on how to tackle this problem. Unfortunately this car has been a bit of a headache for me. I bought it about a month ago as a christmas present for myself and within 200 miles the driveshaft broke after pulling the ebrake one snowy night. That repair costed about 1200$, roughly 80% of the cost of the car and gave me mixed feelings. Then just recently I slid off the road and hit a mailbox that as reinforced with concrete. The concrete got pushed into my radiator and intercooler and caused damage to both. I lost all of my coolant immediately and had to have the car towed home after digging the mailbox out from underneath.

All that said, I ordered a new radiator and was about to remove the old and install the new, when I realized that the Intercooler (what I had originally thought was the radiator) was also damaged. Now I am completely discouraged as a new intercooler is pretty expensive and im not sure how much more difficult of a job it would be. Im wondering what the alternatives are or what the best way to assessing the damage would be. Ive already put into the car what Ive paid for it, so I am trying to be as cost friendly as possible. Any ideas on how to diagnose and fix this would be greatly appreciated! I am mechanically inclined but more so with motorcycles.

You can see in the picture both the radiator and intercooler are damaged, and i am not sure where to go from there.


Thanks in advance.

 

The condenser is also damaged.

It isn't any harder to replace the intercooler at the same time. It comes down with the radiator to replace the radiator. If you don't want air conditioning, you don't have to fix the condenser.

 

Is there any way to identify if the intercooler is usable? I had heard a leaking radiator can be welded/mended. I would prefer to fix this as inexpensively as possible and if thats not an option I would rather scrap the car and cut my losses.

 

You'd have to smoke test the intercooler for leaks.
I'd replace the radiator. I doubt anyone would repair it.

 

Do you think I can get away with just replacing the radiator or is it obvious that the intercooler also needs to be replaced?

 

Can't tell from that picture.

 

aftermarket radiators cost about $100-125 (Behrs / Nissan are reputable brands) - with a damaged core, repairs would cost more than that. As to the condensor - if your AC still works, its holding the refridgerant and you are in luck for the time being. If not, as ES says you can live without AC. Agreed that intercoolers are expensive ($400 or so at Tasca Parts) but if you lose boost via a leak, you will likely throw a check engine light and have some diminished power. The thing is you will be doing the work to replace the radiator which will give you access to the intercooler. If you don't test it (ie smoke or pressure test) You'd be repeating the labor should the intercooler leak.